Making Jacob Zuma’s honeymoon last

Victory for Mr Zuma in the last presidential elections was a victory for democracy. His predecessor had tried to make him politically irrelevant. Thrown out of office as the Vice President, Zuma has bounced back. He emerged as the president South Africans wanted. Thanks to his backers. Support from South Africa’s powerful labour unions has […]

Victory for Mr Zuma in the last presidential elections was a victory for democracy. His predecessor had tried to make him politically irrelevant. Thrown out of office as the Vice President, Zuma has bounced back. He emerged as the president South Africans wanted.

Thanks to his backers. Support from South Africa’s powerful labour unions has earned him victory, having promised to create more jobs and deal with poverty. Now the president is doing his best to take care of the groups that helped him. Mr Zuma’s position as a favourite in the last election gathered strength from the opposition almost everyone put up against Mbeki. ANC top men said Mbeki was high-handed. Labour had cited high rate of unemployment, claiming that the former president was too pro-business. Zuma who connected well with the unions was a natural choice. The nature of the support for Zuma indeed became clearer after Mbeki went home to rest. In the period before the presidential election, ANC experienced a split and a section went into opposition. This fact may have more relevance in the years to come. For the moment, Zuma has made everyone happy except the core opposition parties as well as the masses.

Foreign investors are relaxed, noticing that the new president follows Mbeki’s steps by standing with business. ‘We are encouraged that what was a business friendly environment has been maintained,” an official of T Rowe Price International Plc based in London but has assets in South Africa said. As for ANC rank and file, it is being catered for. The unions too are comfortable, at least for the moment as Zuma kicked out two known union foes – Finance Minister Trevor Manuel and central bank governor, Tito Mboweni.

Expectedly, it is the opposition parties that are up in arms. They say Zuma has failed to take the necessary steps against corrupt officials; they say he makes inappropriate appointments. That’s not surprising. President Zuma brought strange bedfellows into his cabinet among whom are senior Communist Party members. And there are unionists too.

But observers say it is in the interest of the unions to claim that Zuma is with them. And investors have a point when they pour encomiums just as ferocious ANC is not expected to bite its own, at least, not this early in the day.

The reality, observers say, is the high rate of unemployment for which the president doesn’t seem to have found a winning formula. There are other social issues such as poverty as well as the level of crime rate. As the Democratic Alliance parliamentarian, Athol Trollip accused, ‘There is a yawning gap between the president’s words and actions.” And that’s where the issue lies.     

Ajibade, a consultant writer, lives in Abuja